


Transatlantic

by Rebecca Hb (beckyh2112)



Category: The Mummy Series
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 21:47:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/142052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beckyh2112/pseuds/Rebecca%20Hb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three phone-calls before, during, and after the mummy problem in Peru.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Transatlantic

**Author's Note:**

  * For [galaxysoup](https://archiveofourown.org/users/galaxysoup/gifts).



> I played fast and loose with the [Chinchorro mummies](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinchorro_mummies) for this. The Mummy movies generally play fast and loose with their mummies and lore, but it bugs me not to say that I am doing it.

  
**Transatlantic**

***

Evelyn moved the phone to her other ear and checked the clock. A quarter of an hour was _quite_ long enough for this nonsense, she decided. "Jonathan, I don't think Mr. Uhle discovered mummies just to spite you."

"He could have kept it to himself!" Her brother easily rolled with the interruption of his tirade against Uhle's discovery of the Indian mummies on the coast. " _Mummies_! Pah! I didn't come all the way out here to the other side of the world just to find more mummies!"

It sounded very interesting, really, and if she were ten years younger, she'd already be badgering Rick to get them passage to the Americas. She was still halfway tempted to do so - her love of Egypt had never dimmed, but in all the years since Ahm Shere, she hadn't been able to make herself return. The way Jonathan described where the mummies were found, she could almost-

Oh, she was just being silly. A desert on the other side of the world with mummies wasn't anymore Egypt than England was.

"Jonathan, he's a scholar. Scholars don't keep that sort of thing to themselves."

"Evie, don't take his side. It's bad enough you took their side in China."

"That wasn't taking their side, that was trying to put the mummy we released back into his grave."

"And being shot at! And watching Rick **die**!" Jonathan's voice broke. "Evie, _you_ died, and he died, and who's going to be next? Alex?"

Tears stung her eyes. Thank God it rarely snowed during the winters here. Snow, ice, biting cold - too many bad memories. "I think," she said with false cheer, "that you're the next one in line for a horrible mummy-related death."

She'd expected to wind her brother up with that one, but instead he just sounded subdued. "I'm sorry, old mum. I didn't mean to-"

"Don't worry about it. Everything worked out for the best, you know," she said, knowing what Jonathan meant without him needing to say it. They'd always been like that, ever since they were little. There were years when she wouldn't talk to him, and years when he was too busy getting into trouble to check on her, but when things were truly bad, she could count on Jonathan to be there and he could count on her to do the same.

"Right," Jonathan said, rallying himself. "Well then. When the mummies rise, do not send the little necromancer out to visit. I've already invited Ardeth to Peru."

" _Jonathan_..."

"I'm serious, Evie. Alex is going to develop a complex, and I don't want to be around when he loses it and decides immortality and human sacrifice is the way to go."

Sometimes, she really couldn't tell when her brother was joking. For the sake of not slapping him the next time she saw him, she was going to assume he was. "I'm going to hang up now, Jonathan. Good night."

"It's barely tea-time here, Evie."

" _Good night_ , Jonathan."

***

"What did I tell you?!" Jonathan demanded. "Mummies! Why can't they stay decently dead like other people?"

Evelyn rubbed sleep out of her eyes, holding the phone in place with her cheek and shoulder. A storm had blown in during the afternoon, and it hadn't quieted down until a few hours ago. From the sounds of it now, though, it would have woken her if the phone hadn't. "-Jonathan? Do you know what time it is?"

"Yes, I know what bloody time it is in London, Evie!"

Her brain caught up with his words. "-You have mummies?"

"Do I have mummies? YES, I have mummies! I told you three weeks ago I was going to have mummies!"

"There were hundreds of mummies in Egypt that never rose from the dead, you know," she said, mind racing. They couldn't take a ship, a ship would never get there in time, but a plane was out of the question in this storm. "Look, I'll be there as soon as I can, just-"

Hold on, she meant to say, but the line went dead.

The phone fell from suddenly nerveless fingers as she yelled for her husband.

***

The storm was finally starting to die when the phone rang. Evelyn startled against her husband, and he deliberately, forcefully removed his finger from the trigger of his gun. She snatched up the receiver, hoping for a miracle-

"Evie?" Jonathan sounded tired. "Evie, I'm all right."

"Oh, _Jonathan_!" Tears welled up in her eyes, and she clutched the phone to her ear. "What **happened**?"

"Well, you know. Tragic love story thousands of years ago, insane use of magic on someone very powerful, cultists who have far too much time on their hands... Ardeth says hello, by the way. Yes, sullen glowering counts as hello. Stop looking at me like that."

She sniffled and snuggled closer to Rick. "Jonathan, what did you do?"

"What makes you think I did anything?" he asked with wounded innocence. "I'll have you know I have been nothing but entirely level-headed, scrupulous, and honest."

"Did you come into a bridge you're looking to sell, too?"

"All right, so I might have let the priestess come down to my bar, and she might currently be scaring customers away with her mask."

"Her mask?" Evelyn scoured her brain for anything she knew about indigenous South American religions. The answer was depressing, really; she didn't know the slightest thing, as she was quite certain the Aztecs were a Central American people.

"I couldn't just let her _die_ , Evie. -No one asked you."

"Ardeth thinks you could have?" Unease prickled down her spine, like sand spilling through a keyhole.

"Well, you know," Jonathan said uncomfortably, "she is already dead. So I wouldn't have been letting her die, really."

Evelyn tilted her head up to contemplate the ceiling. There were so **many** things she could say right now that she was completely at a loss for _which_ to say.

"Evie?"

"Jonathan, didn't you call me less than a month ago to rant for half an hour about how horrible the discovery of mummies in Peru was?"

"I'll have you know that went on no longer than fifteen minutes."

"Because I interrupted you."

"... Because you interrupted me, yes."

She sighed. "Well, I hope you know what you're getting into." A pause. "Actually, no, I don't, because that would mean you've done this before, and I don't think I could deal with it if you had."

"Evie, it's not as if I'm taking her out for dinner and drinks. She's just spending time in the bar until she gets her bearings in the modern world. That's all!"

Dinner and drinks? She raised an eyebrow. The trip to Peru was _definitely_ still on. "Of course. Rick and I should be down there in a couple of weeks. Alex is off in China still-"

"He can stay there!"

"Jonathan, if you call my son a necromancer again, I am going to slap you."

"Now, Evie, you know I like Alex- just as long as he's far away from mummies. Because then people start dying, he starts raising the dead, and it's going to end in tears someday, mark my words."

"Good-bye, Jonathan," she said firmly.

"Good-bye, Evie," he said, a touch of the rascal of Egypt in his voice like she hadn't heard since-

Since she'd died.

The phone clicked, and the dial-tone hummed in her ear.

"I miss you," she whispered.

  
**-End-**   



End file.
